


Every Rose Has a Thorn (and even tame wolves bite)

by Netgirl_y2k



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/F, Female Friendship, Future Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-16
Updated: 2012-02-16
Packaged: 2017-10-31 07:30:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/341540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Netgirl_y2k/pseuds/Netgirl_y2k
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the dark, under the bedclothes, Margaery calls Sansa her Queen in the North, her Red Wolf.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Every Rose Has a Thorn (and even tame wolves bite)

"Lady Margaery, welcome to Winterfell."

Margaery Tyrell has been led into the great hall by half a dozen Targaryen men-at-arms, still red-nosed and shivering from the bitter early spring winds. Sansa makes a note to order her some warmer garments; it would not do for the Rose of Highgarden to fall ill.

Margaery bends the knee, surrounded by queen's men she dare do nothing else, and says, "Lady Stark."

"My lady does me too much honour," Sansa replies from her place upon the high seat of Winterfell. "My brother Rickon is lord here. I merely serve as his castellan while he is fostered at White Harbor."

"I see," says Margaery, straightening and meeting Sansa's eyes for the first time. "Lady Sansa, then."

"I'm sure your journey has been long and tiring." Sansa knows that it has, spring snows made the kingsroad impassable for nearly a month and forced Margaery's party to seek shelter at Riverrun. "We've had rooms prepared for you. Maester Alleras will show you the way, and I'll join you there shortly."

Sansa turns her attention to the queen's men who've brought Margaery here to her, offering them rest and refreshments before they begin the long journey south.

*

"I was half expecting to be put in the dungeons."

Winterfell is not Highgarden or King's Landing, but Margaery's chambers are second in luxury only to Sansa's own. Sansa has dismissed the maester and the guards, and she and Margaery are alone.

"You are not a prisoner here, Margaery," says Sansa.

"Well, I am too old to be your ward, and your queen already has her hostages; a boy and a girl, my brother Garlan's children. Cupbearers, she calls them, but they are hostages to my father's good behaviour."

"They will come to no harm, Daenerys is fond of children."

"And yet she has none of her own. I find that peculiar, don't you?"

Sansa smiles tightly at that. "I presume you did not say anything of the kind in front of Her Grace's men?"

"I am no fool. And you still haven't answered my question, if I'm not a prisoner or a hostage, what am I to you, Sansa?"

"You are my guest, and I intend to offer you every comfort I can."

"And if I do not wish to avail myself of your hospitality?"

"You are free to go at any time." This is not quite true, and even if it were they both know that Margaery has nowhere else _to_ go. "But Maester Alleras tells me that more storms are coming, and the kingsroad will most likely become impossible to travel. And, if you don't mind my saying so, House Tyrell is not overly endowed with friends at the moment."

Margaery cocks her head at this, and her lips twitch into a tiny, unwilling smile. "We're friends, are we?"

"We were once," says Sansa, "and I should very much like it if we could be again."

*

Even in the inner keep, with the fires blazing and the hot springs heating the very stones beneath their feet, Margaery shivers.

Sansa sends for a seamstress from the winter town and watches as she measures Margaery for warmer clothes, more suitable for a northern lady. The woman asks Sansa for her opinion on colour schemes, and Sansa has a brief, obscene desire to see Margaery wrapped entirely in the colours of House Stark.

"Green and gold, I think," Sansa says, "those are the Tyrell colours."

Sansa still has several of Alayne Stone's gowns at the bottom of a trunk. She will allow Margaery to keep her house colours, it seems like the least she can do.

*

Sansa finds Margaery up on the outer wall, huddled underneath two cloaks and looking out over the country. The wolfswood dominates the view, but the kingsroad can be seen wending its way north under half-melted snow too.

"It's lovely," says Sansa. "The North, I mean. When I was young all I wanted was to go south and I never saw how beautiful it was here, and since I've returned that's all I can see."

"Highgarden is beautiful," Margaery says, her voice strained. "Your queen is never going to let me go home, is she?"

"I'm sorry," and Sansa truly is, she knows what it is to be kept from your home. "But the queen wanted to send you to the silent sisters; believe me or don't, but by having you brought to Winterfell I really was trying to help."

"Why?"

"Because, whatever your motives were, you tried to help me once."

"It is one benefit of our sex, I suppose," says Margaery, looking north. "If I'd been born a boy she probably would have sent me to the Wall."

"Strange as it may sound, the Wall is beautiful too, in its own way."

Margaery looks curiously at Sansa. "You've been to the Wall?"

"Only once, one of my brothers is buried there."

"I'm sorry."

"As am I."

*

Margaery has a standing invitation to join Sansa for breakfast in her solar, but she doesn't often avail herself of it, preferring to break her fast in her bedchamber alone. This morning is an exception.

"This last winter was a long one," Margaery observes, reaching for a honey cake. "I've often wondered, what are the Stark words when winter is already upon us?"

"We told you this would happen," Sansa answers without looking up from the letters Maester Alleras delivered with breakfast; one from the queen, one from Tyrion, and one from Lord Manderly.

The first part of the queen's letter has been dictated to a maester, orders from the Iron Throne to the Stark in Winterfell concerning taxes, the forthcoming harvest, and upkeep of the kingsroad. The second part is in Dany's own hand, and inquires after Sansa's health and happiness, and tells her that the queen misses her.

Sansa smiles at that. Tyrion, Ser Barristan, and Ser Jorah are all devoted to the queen in their own ways but Sansa can well imagine how their exclusive company might prove wearisome.

"And your brother Rickon," Margaery continues, frowning slightly, "he must be all but a man grown now, surely?"

Finished with the queen's letter, Sansa picks up Lord Manderly's.

"You'll be able to meet him soon enough, he and Lord Manderly are to visit Winterfell. I must go and begin preparations for the feast."

With that Sansa departs, snatching the last honey cake from Margaery's plate.

*

Rickon is a man grown, but he still speaks like the boy he wasn't allowed to be until recently. He feeds Shaggydog scraps under the table and enthusiastically tells Sansa of his plans to visit Greywater Watch.

This is Sansa's gift to him; the boyhood that was stolen from him by war, and winter, and Lannisters.

From certain angles Rickon looks like their lord father, like Jon Snow, even a little like Arya. But mostly Sansa sees Robb in him.

*

After the feast one of her ladies knocks at the door of Sansa's bedchamber and asks if she'll admit Lady Margaery despite the late hour.

"That was a pretty piece of mummery," says Margaery once they are alone.

Suddenly wishing she'd put something on over her bedrobe before admitting Margaery, Sansa says with icy courtesy, "My lady, it's late."

"Very pretty, especially the way you curtsied and knelt and called him your lord brother."

"What are you talking about?"

"My lady grandmother would have approved, Sansa. You've stolen Winterfell from its rightful lord, and you've done it so neatly that no one realises it's been stolen."

Sansa takes a step forward, intending to slap Margaery's face and isn't entirely sure how she ends up kissing her instead, hands fisted in Margaery's brown curls, pressing their bodies together and pushing Margaery until her back smacks against the wall.

"How dare you?" she hisses into Margaery's mouth. "How _dare_ you?"

*

Winterfell could have been Sansa's by right. All she had to do was ask.

Parts of King's Landing were still aflame when Daenerys Stormborn took Sansa's face in her hands and kissed her chastely on the lips.

"Ask me for anything, a husband, land, titles, gold. Ask me for anything and it's yours."

Sansa could have asked for Winterfell, Dany would have granted it to her along with enough strength to hold it. All Sansa had to do was be willing to wage war on her last remaining brother.

"I want to go home," she'd whispered instead.

*

Sansa is face down on her mattress, Margaery Tyrell pressing open-mouthed kisses down her spine, when she remembers something Tyrion Lannister had said to her years before.

_In the dark I am the knight of flowers._

Sansa laughs into her pillows, laughs and laughs.

"Something amusing, my lady of Winterfell?" says a miffed sounding Margaery Tyrell against the nape of Sansa's neck.

"No, I just--" Sansa rolls onto her back. Framed by moonlight Margaery does look lovely, too old now to be a maiden from a tale. And just as well, Sansa thinks, the world is unkind to storybook maidens. "I just want to look at you," she says, pulling Margaery down into a kiss.

*

"Robb was my favourite brother."

Sansa isn't sure if Margaery is awake. She is turned away from Sansa, the moonlight painting a stripe across the curve of her hip.

"Robb was my favourite brother and I'm sure he tried to be a good king, but they cut his head off and stitched on his wolf's. And Rickon is so much like him, he'd kneel and let them proclaim him King in the North, and he'd try to rule well and wisely. And Daenerys would put him down, with fire and blood. He is my last remaining brother, and he will not die a fool's death, I will not permit it. And that is why I took Winterfell from him."

After a long silence Margaery says, "They say it took Loras nearly a year to die."

In truth it took longer than that, Sansa has heard that he was still clinging to life when Daenerys took Dragonstone. But Margaery needs to know that no more than Sansa needed to know what the Freys did with Robb's head.

"I know," she says, "I'm sorry."

*

"I sometimes think of the life we could have led," says Margaery over supper one evening. "If you'd never been married to the Imp, or gone to the Vale, and thrown yourself on the mercy of the dragon queen. And if my father hadn't--"

"Supported the Mummer's Dragon when he attempted to usurp Daenerys?" Sansa supplies with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes. That. I think about it sometimes, that other life. Tommen was just a child and Willas would not have been a troublesome husband for you. I think we could have been very great friends."

Sansa catches the unspoken meaning; they could have been great friends rather than whatever it is they are now.

*

"Your queen would have me die a maid," says Margaery. This comes as news to Sansa, who has just crawled up her lady's body, nipping at her peachy skin and soothing the bite marks with her tongue. "And I can see why, I was queen to three kings."

"Nearly four," adds Sansa. "I think it was your betrothal to Aegon that most offended Her Grace."

"My father always was overambitious," says Margaery, offhandedly. "But the queen is concerned that any man married to me would get ideas about calling himself a king."

"Men do get these ideas."

"What I don't understand, is why she allows you to remain unmarried?"

"Rickon will marry and have sons, Winterfell doesn't need my marriage."

"I'm not speaking of Winterfell. You are the queen's great supporter, you are the queen's great friend, surely your hand in marriage is worth a lot on those grounds alone?"

Sansa changes the subject by slipping her hand between Margaery's thighs, and Margaery cants her hips up to meet Sansa's fingers. "A maid? Joffrey died, and Tommen was a boy, but Renly was handsome and gallant enough."

Margaery lets out a full-throated laugh at that. "Gods, I can't believe I've allowed someone so naive into my bed."

"Actually, I think you'll find this is my bed."

"It's my bedchamber."

"And Winterfell is mine, as are all the beds in it."

*

They are walking in the godswood. Margaery had never seen one before coming to Winterfell and still finds it somewhat disturbing. Sansa teases her about this, but takes her arm and keeps their walk to the edges of the trees, avoiding the deepest part of the wood and the heart tree.

"The queen has mentioned marriage to me," Sansa confides. "She hopes that I may reconsider my marriage to Tyrion Lannister."

When Margaery doesn't say anything Sansa continues, "I won't."

"It would make a certain amount of sense, I'd think," notes Margaery, overly casually. "However much you'd like to pretend that it doesn't, your queen's lack of an heir does present a problem. And what's the next best thing to her own flesh and blood? Why, the child of her two strongest supporters, both scions of great houses, who overcame their differences to restore the rightful queen to her throne."

That's the romantic version of Dany's rise to the Iron Throne; the true version involved a lot more bickering, infighting, and wrangling uncooperative dragons, but Margaery already knows this. 

"I could almost believe you jealous," Sansa teases.

"I am nothing if not the Queen of Thorns' heir."

"It will not come to that," Sansa promises. "I know Dany. She knows what it is to be sold. She will not force the matter."

Margaery looks unconvinced, and Sansa wishes that she could share Sansa's faith in Daenerys.

*

In the dark, under the bedclothes, Margaery calls Sansa her Queen in the North, her Red Wolf.

Sansa is bone tired of the game of thrones, and she long ago chose her queen, but in the dark with Margaery's words whispered against her skin, well, it seems like there's no harm in the fantasy.


End file.
